Step Two of the Journey Almost at an End

Busy day and I'm beat.

About 8:30, I got started:

I was able to find all 10 crabs and remove them safely from the tank.  I housed them in a small bucket along with a small piece of live rock for them the play with while they waited.

Next came the live rock.  I removed all the pieces and placed them in a tub with some tank water.  Forgot all about shaking them off in waste water... ended up shaking them up in the tank before removing them.  Just that much more to vacuum.  I'll chalk that one up to lesson learned.

With only the 6 Damsels and substrate remaining, I began to vacuum.  The first 3 or 4 buckets were just the surface detritus - mostly from shaking the rock in the tank instead of waste water.  The next 10 or 15 (I'm estimating, wasn't keeping track) buckets were from deep vacuuming.

When the waste bucket got full, I applied the strainer to the top of the bucket and gently dumped all but a gallon or so back in.  Sometimes I'd let the bucket settle a bit, other times not.  The strainer seemed to work great at keeping the visible detritus in the bucket.  Not back for $4.

Then in came time to wrangle up the Damsels.  I only netted 5 of the 6.  Somehow, one of the Domino Damsels physically disappeared.  So I bagged up 5 Damsels instead of 6.  I figured the Damsel may be in with the rock.  But I did clean them off pretty good before removing them from the tank...

The live rock was then placed back in the tank.  I hate how it looks now.  I'm going to have to mess with it a bit...  Maybe study some photos and videos to see what went where.  No Domino Damsel.  The other Domino Damsel perished while bagged.

Then off to the LFS at 11:00.  Grabbed 10 gallons of RO/DI saltwater, a 750gph powerhead and a 6 in 1 test kit, and was credited some money for the return of the Damsels.  They must have thought I was bullshitting them when I mentioned how I lost more Damsels today than in the two months of having the tank, especially when I pointed out that one was physically missing.

I pulled out another couple gallons of water just to make sure I had room for the 10 I bought.  If a person finds out there's not enough room in the tank for the water, it's already too late to do anything about it.  Ended up pulling out too much water overall.  I could probably use at least another 5 to fill it completely.

Installed the powerhead, aiming down and along the back stretch of the tank behind the rock.  For now, it's something to help the rock purge itself of nutrients and to keep detritus suspended longer, allowing the filters a better chance to grab it.

The water is still a bit cloudy from all the substrate and rock work.  Detritus floats around roughly counterclockwise and stays suspended in the water.  Gone are the days where the tank would clear up (usually by settling) in an hour or so.  I'm curious if I'm still going to have daily skimmer dumps...

I'll let the tank clear up for a day or two, then we'll see about Clownfish.

Still no Domino.